Catherine Matthias

My love of children’s books grew while working in a preschool when I was in my mid-twenties. A few years later, my six early reader picture books were published in English and Spanish by Childrens Press, a division of Scholastic Publishing. The two nonfiction books, I Can Be a Police Officer and I Can Be a Computer Operator, were part of a career series. The fiction titles are Over-Under, Out the Door, I Love Cats, and Too Many Balloons.

In 2018, I became a Certified Irlen Syndrome Screener, and in 2021, my adult nonfiction book, The Word Gobblers—a handbook for parents working with children struggling to read, was published by Square One Publishers, an imprint of Globe Pequot. In 2025, I published When the Sky Turned to Dust, a middle-grade historical fiction that takes place during the Great Depression and Midwest Dust Bowl.

I live with my husband Stewart Jones in rural Joseph, Oregon, across the valley from the beautiful Wallowa Mountains.